Male Abuse Awareness Week

There is a cultural bias which maintains that males cannot be victims. Males are expected to be confident, knowledgeable, and aggressive. When boys are victimized, they tend to be blamed more for their abuse and are viewed as less in need of care and support, than girls who are abused.

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Types of male abuse, facts and statistics

- At least 41 percent of the victims of domestic violence are men. (Harvey P. Forehand)
- As many as 1 in 5 males will be sexually abused before the age of 18. And one in five of adult rape victims are male. (Federal Bureau of Investigation in the US, or FBI)
- One in six men will be a victim of domestic abuse in their lifetime. (The British Crime Survey 2006/07 figures)
- Same-sex batterers use forms of abuse similar to those of heterosexual batterers. They have an additional weapon in the threat of “outing” their partner to family, friends, employers or community. (Lundy, Abuse That Dare Not Speak Its Name: Assisting Victims of Lesbian and Gay Domestic Violence in Massachusetts, 28 New Eng. L. Rev. 273 (Winter 1993)
- women who abuse men tend to prefer forms of abuse that don’t involve physical violence. The hurt, the injury caused by the habitual use of vicious mockery, frequent emotional blackmail, spreading odious lies and so on aren’t visible. (Harvey P. Forehand)
- Male Sexual Harassment in the Work Place on the Rise; According to a report by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission there were a record amount of harassment complaints filed by men in 2006. The figures given in the report state that of the 12,025 sexual harassment claims made in 2006 15.4 percent of these claims came from men. This shows a significant increase of male harassment cases made in the last ten years of 4.5. ([link])
- Munchausen by Proxy is when someone is causing illness or injury in another to obtain attention; usually by a parent or caregiver against a child (in 85% of cases the child is male) ([link])

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Useful websites and books

Why men do not disclose – [link]
ManKind (chariity supporting male victims of abuse) – [link]
M-Power – [link]

Abused Boys: The Neglected Victims of Sexual Abuse – by Mic Hunter
Victims No Longer: Men Recovering from Incest and Other Sexual Child Abuse – by Mike Lew
The House On Telegraph Hill (An Asylum): Growing Up with Abusive Parents and a Lifetime After – by Charles S. Wilson

Types of abuse of adults

Domestic violence

Domestic violence refers to the physical, emotional, and sexual abuse of a spouse or domestic partner (regardless of gender). Early research into the problem of wife battering focused on middle-class couples, but it has since been recognised that spouse abuse occurs among wealthy professional couples as well. In addition, studies done in the late 1980s and 1990s indicate that domestic violence also occurs among gay and lesbian couples. It is estimated that four million women in the United States are involved in abusive marriages or relationships; moreover, most female murder victims are killed by their spouse or partner rather than by strangers.

Domestic violence illustrates the tendency of abusive people to attack anyone they perceive as vulnerable; most men who batter women also abuse their children; some battered women abuse their children; and abusive humans are frequently cruel to animals.

Elder abuse

Elder abuse has become a subject of national concern in the last two decades. As older adults are living longer, many become dependent for years on adult caregivers, who may be either their own adult children or nursing home personnel. Care of the elderly can be extremely stressful, especially if the older adult is suffering from dementia. Elder abuse may include physical hitting or slapping; withholding their food or medications; tying them to their chair or bed; neglecting to bathe them or help them to the toilet; taking their personal possessions, including money or property; and restricting or cutting off their contacts with friends and relatives.

Abusive professional relationships

Adults can also be abused by sexually exploitative doctors, therapists, clergy, and other helping professionals. Although instances of this type of abuse were dismissed prior to the 1980s as consensual participation in sexual activity, most professionals now recognize that these cases actually reflect the practitioner’s abuse of social and educational power. About 85% of sexual abuse cases in the professions involve male practitioners and female clients; another 12% involve male practitioners and male clients; and the remaining 3% involve female practitioners and either male or female clients. The victims of many of these abusive relationships are men and women who sought professional help in order to deal with the effects of childhood abuse.

Workplace bullying

Workplace bullying is, like stalking, increasingly recognized as interpersonal abuse. It should not be confused with sexual harassment or racial discrimination. Workplace bullying refers to verbal abuse of other workers, interfering with their work, withholding the equipment or other resources they need to do their job, or invading their personal space, including touching them in a controlling manner. Half of all workplace bullies are women, and the majority (81%) are bosses or supervisors.

Stalking

Stalking is the repeated pursuit or surveillance of another person by physical or electronic means. Many cases of stalking are extensions of domestic violence, in that the stalker is attempting to track down a wife or girlfriend who left him. However, stalkers may also be casual acquaintances, workplace colleagues, or even total strangers. Stalking may include a number of criminal or abusive behaviors, including forced entry to the person’s home, destruction of cars or other personal property, anonymous letters to the person’s friends or employer, or repeated phone calls, letters, or e-mails. About 80% of stalking cases reported to police involve men stalking women.

Male rape and sexual abuse

What is male sexual assault?
Male sexual assault is when you have been forced to take part in any sexual act with another man or woman which you did not willingly consent to. Even if you did not resist or fight back at the time of the attack, it is still assault.

Who can it happen to?
Quite simply, anyone. It could have happened to you whilst you were a child or a teenager, or as an adult. It is not a ‘gay crime’ – it happens to more straight men than gay men.

Who are the perpetrators?
Again, it could be anyone – male or female. But the facts show that more men were abused from within the family than outside, and more men were raped by people they knew rather than strangers.

How common is it?
It’s much more common than most people think. Research statistics tell us that almost 3% of men reported a non-consensual sexual experience as adults and over 5% of men reported sexual abuse as a child.

Is it a crime?
In England there were changes to the 1956 Sexual Offences act in 1994 which made the rape of a man an equal crime to rape of a woman. Further updates to the Sexual Offences act in 2004 mean that the different types of sexual assault that men can experiences have been defined.

What kind of effects can male survivors experience?
It varies from individual to individual, but common effects include; feelings of isolation, depression, anger, anxiety, issues about sexuality and gender, substance abuse, self-harm, eating disorders, negative body image, fears about abusing, hyperconsciousness of body and appearance,  PTSD/C-PTSD and DID.

Who else is affected?
The psychological and mental health issues which survivors often experience, can also lead to real problems with relationships. So anyone who shares his life, be it partner, friend or family, can be affected.

Why is male rape and sexual abuse such a taboo subject?
Firstly, few people even realise that male rape exists. So a man who is trying to come to terms with sexual assault can feel like there is nowhere to turn. But secondly, society itself places certain expectations on men – they are supposed to be “strong” and “able to take care of themselves”. This only heightens the sense of confusion and self-doubt felt by survivors of male rape and sexual abuse; many of them end up blaming themselves.

Why do so many men suffer in silence?
Because of our society’s taboo about male rape and sexual assault it is rare that a victim will go to the police or seek immediate help – on the contrary, he will often be as desperate to keep it a secret as his attacker is. As well as the trauma and feelings of shame, many of our clients face the difficulties of people’s attitudes to male rape and abuse.

For more information on male rape see here

When men are the victims of rape

It is impossible to estimate how many men are raped each year. Whereas 60% of women never report being raped the number of men who don’t report it is likely to be far higher, because they do not want to admit to the humiliation and degradation and do not want to have their sexuality and muscularity questioned. The problem has been ignored for decades, in part for this reason.

Men raped by men:

Many people assume incorrectly that the only males who are raped are children, or that male rape only occurs in prisons and between homosexuals. While it is true that many male victims of rape are young, the age range is as great as that of female victims, ranging from a few months to over 90 years of age. The primary difference seems to be the number of assailants and the degree of force used.
Male rape victims are often attacked by groups of men and usually sustain more physical trauma that female victims. Those victims who come to the attention of the authorities, however, may be a highly select group, since the physical trauma may be what precipitates their coming forward.
Male rape is more common in settings where women are absent, such as prisons. As with female victims, rapists attack men in an attempt to assert dominance and control.
Male survivors face many of the same problems that female survivors face. Like female survivors, males often are not believed or they are accused of being homosexuals who were “asking for it”. An article published in the southwestern medical journal in 1980 adviced physicians when examining a male rape survivor to “maintain a high level of suspicion, since in some cases the “victim” may have an ulterior motive in reporting the alleged attack. Even in the case of a child, the story may be fabricated in a bid for attention.”
One of the most devastating issue that a male survivor faces is having his masculinity and sexuality questioned by others. Many men protect theirselves from feeling vulnerable by beleieving that only gay men are raped, and so logically the survivor must “really be gay” and “must have wanted it”.

Men raped by women:

The belief that men cannot respond sexually against their will is incorrect. In reality male sexual responses can occur in a variety of emotional states, including anger and fear. For more information on this see here
In reported cases of woman on man rape men have been forced by a single woman or a group of women to participate in sexual activity, including intercourse under threat of physical violence. The men often reported being physical restrained, fearing not only for their general safety but also for their lives.
These men, just as anyone who is raped, suffer great emotional trauma, which often lasts for years after the event. Men raped by women are also more likely to hide the event out of fear of disbelief or ridicule, which often aggravates the emotional distress. The most immediate impact is a feel of disgrace and humiliation that makes them feel “less of a man”.
While they usually come to the attention of therapists when seeking help for sexual dysfunction, the men often do not associate the sexual issues with the rape. Once in treatment they may be involved with a therapist for years before divulging the assault.

Another major issue for men who responded sexually during an assault is that they later feel abnormal – that any “normal” man would have not responded. This adds to their feelings of inadequacy and may make them question their own sexuality or gender preferences. This is especially problematic in cases of teenage boys being assaulted by men.

Although men are often seen as the aggressors in reality they can be just as vulnerable and as traumatised as women, being victimised in the same way and succumbing to the same fears and trauma. Though the gender roles and expectations that society holds can often make the aftermath of a rape even more destructive to a man than it is to a woman.

The “rape controversy”

Had an unfun week… many arguments with many people, mainly on the topic of rape… on people lying about being raped, using it to punish men… which is odd as last time I checked rape was not gender specific, men can be raped too and women can be rapists.
So thought would take some time to discuss the topic here.

Now firstly I know I am biased, I hate the idea of anyone lying about having being raped for several reasons, the major one being that it makes people question the truth of the stories of those of us who HAVE been raped. I don’t think that people who spread these ideas of people lying about it realise how much it hurts to have people call you a liar. When you are raped all control is lost, your perception of the world is shattered, it’s no longer a kind, nice, safe place, suddenly it becomes a unknown, scary place full of danger and dangerous people. You blame yourself, and you’re convinced that others will blame you too, that they will judge you, pick the event apart and find a way to confirm that, yes, it was your fault.

Imagine if you left your car parked outside your home, that you always leave it in that place, but then one day you go outside and its been broken into. Then you go to the police and instead of helping they say “well you shouldn’t have left it in the street”. Now yes, that may be a valid point, but it’s not really helpful is it? Instead of being helpful advice it instead makes it seem as if you caused the burglary rather than that you could have prevented it.

Last week someone also said to me that if there is no evidence then no crime occurred :/ , seriously? So therefore we can all do whatever we like as long as we are clever and don’t leave evidence? I could murder someone by pushing them off a bridge and be totally innocent as the evidence may point to suicide.
How many trials do you think have ended due to insuffient evidence? In fact most legal systems do not even use the word “innocent” in part for this reason, a lack of evidence may be grounds to end a trial but a lack of evidence by no means proves innocence… a lack of evidence is just that, no proof neither of innocence nor guilt.

In the cases of rape this idea of evidence can be even more complicated. For a start few (if any) rapists are stupid enough to commit the act in the middle of a crowded street, so that’s witnesses out of the question. That and the fact of bystander apathy, I mean how many times have you (the reader) walked past a man screaming at his partner, a woman crying on the floor, etc, and not intervened? How many people do you think have been cornered crying out for help only for no one to come? I can even give a few examples of this, the most well known of which has to be the story of the “good Samaritan”, which to be honest I expect most of you will have heard, but for those who have not I’ll give a quick overview: in this tale a man is mugged and left hurt in the road, as he lay there people walked past crossing over to the other side of the road and ignored his plight. Eventually a man came along and helped the man, hence the name of the story of “the good Samaritan”. Another example of this is that of Kitty Genovese, who in 1964 was walking to her car in New York when a man attacked her with a knife, she yelled out and as lights turned on in a nearby building the man fled, when no one appeared on the scene though he returned to continue the attack. The whole incident lasted over half an hour during which time she managed to drag herself to the door of a building and was witnessed by thirty-eight, but not one person intervened or even called the police.
In college all the women had to attend rape safety sessions, in which we were told that if we were ever in a situation where we needed help never to shout “help” nor “rape” but instead to call “fire” as people are more likely to come!!!
And even when there are witnesses how often do you think they actually come forward? Even when they do they get treated like liars or criminals themselves for not intervening, told that if what was happening was wrong then they would have done something wouldn’t they? So obviously they are lying or exaggerating. Let’s just ignore the idea that a person can be scared, let’s ignore the idea of self preservation, let’s ignore that the person may not have known what to do, instead obviously they are just lying.

How about DNA? Surely there is DNA evidence isn’t there? Well not all rapes leave DNA evidence, using an object is technically rape, and objects do not have DNA. Also rapists are not stupid, they do know that they have DNA, they do know that they will leave evidence. Some will even force their victim to shower after the event, or will put things in place to ensure that they cannot report the event for a period of time which will limit the available evidence. Even without this though it can take a person a whole fully comprehend what happened, and even longer before they feel able to talk about or admit it. After being raped you’re not thinking about the evidence, in fact you’ll do anything to not think about anything involving the incident at all. But you can still smell them, still feel them, feel the dirt on you, slowly working its way through your skin into your very being. All you want to do is clean it off, to clean them off, to forget about it, to get rid of anything and everything involving it, in the hope that maybe, just maybe, if you clean enough and deny it enough, then maybe it didn’t happen, maybe it was not real.

In fact quite often the main source of evidence comes from character witnesses, and on the basis of a few people saying that the accused is a “nice person” many cases are dropped… as if no person if capable of being nice but also committing a crime… as if any wrong doing can be forgiven or ignored due to a lifetime of “niceness”. If I was to shoplift and then have a few people say “no, she couldn’t have, she’s too nice for that” no one would drop the case, and the fact would be that I had still shoplifted, still committed a crime, and it’s almost a character requirement of abusers to be able to live a double life, otherwise, well they wouldn’t be able to abuse anyone would they? Abusers are masters of deception, able to seem perfectly kind, normal and functional to the outside world, maybe even respected, yet as soon as that front door closes become mean, violent and abusive. How often do we hear on the news neighbours of convicted criminals and abusers say how shocked they are as “they always seemed so nice”?
This can sort of be seen as an example of the “halo effect”. People strive to maintain consistency in their beliefs, often at the expense of the truth. If a person has some salient trait that is good, it tends to colour the way in which all his/her other characteristics are seen. In the eyes of other people they are distorted to fit in with the one estimable trait. People are unwilling to accept that others may be a mixture of good and bad: they try to see them as a consistent whole. So in this case as the character witnesses describe all the persons good traits and list any good deeds they have done people are less likely to be able to imagine them ever doing something bad, especially not something as bad as rape. This is exacerbated by the tendency of the victims character flaws and past sexual history being questioned and enforcised to portray them as “immoral” or “promiscuous”.

One other thing people bring up during this discussion is that some people report a rape only to revoke their statement at a later date, people then interperate this as meaning that the rape never occurred and the initial report was a lie. But you have to take into account how hard and stressful a court case is, especially when you have been raped and so already feel vulnerable. When you report a rape every aspect of your life is picked apart, people imply that you are lying, people take small aspects of your life and blow them up to turn you into the bad one, it’s a painful and stressful experience, and many people just cannot cope with it. Add to this the fact that you have to see the person who did this to you, have to sit in the same room as them, here them accuse your testimony as a life, listen to them blow up every character flaw, all while you have to relive the event over and over both in your mind and through describing it to others.

Ok, now let’s have a think about why on earth anyone would lie about such a thing. Revenge? Honestly what the hell would anyone have to do to you for you to think that the best revenge would be to accuse them of rape? There are a million and one ways to get revenge on someone, who on earth would jump to a rape accusation as their first revenge plan?

Let’s now move on to the statistics, I hate statistics… you can use statistics to prove or disprove basically anything, you can manipulate them to say whatever you want. Also statistics on the topic of rape are difficult to acquire, a lot of people never report what happened to them which naturally messes with the numbers. A lot of people don’t report what happened but do speak to anonymous helplines and charities, so we can get an idea of the figures from adding these to the police reports, but even then we cannot get a definite idea of exactly how many people have been raped. Another thing which often screws with the data is that some reports take children into account whereas others do not which obviously messes with the numbers.
If we were to assume that the 1 in 5 statistic is correct though is this really “fear mongering”. As I was told it was last week? I mean ok, 1 in 5 is a lot, but that still means that 4 in 5 (i.e. the majority) will never experience rape… in fact all the 1 in 5 statistic really means is that pretty much everyone at some point in their lives will know someone who has been raped.

Right… now for the bit that I’ve been putting off… the idea of justifications for rape… when I told someone that I had been raped more than once the person decided that obviously I was a pole-dancer or a hooker, so therefore is it ok to rape people in these professions? Personally I think not, I do not think that you can say that people working in the sex-trade are ok to rape, no one should be ok to rape, because rape is not ok.
Some people seem to think that it’s a woman’s own fault if they were wearing revealing clothing, drunk, alone, etc. But I think that is ridiculous… so what? Men are not responsible at all? Men are just these creatures who cannot help but have sex with anyone who has some skin on show or who has been drinking? I honestly think that this way of thinking is not only hurtful to women, but actually demeaning to men, men are not just masses of instinct who cannot help themselves, and implying that they are is sort of implying that they are a lower being than women…

I have never heard these excuses in the case of male rape though… nor in cases of female rapists. So what can we gather from this? Maybe that people in general either do not believe or think about rape being anything but a man raping a woman, or maybe people think it’s ok to rape women but that the idea of raping a man or of a woman raping someone is not ok? In either of these ideas isn’t the route the same? A bit of a sexist stance?
In fact the idea that all women should not go out (or deserve to be raped if they do) in certain outfits, should not drink, should not go to certain places, etc. is not really too large a leap from “get back in the kitchen” is it? So we should live in a world where men can do whatever they like but if a woman does anything on their own or feel sexually liberated then they are in the wrong and should be raped? In fact that sounds a lot like the world one of my abusers would have liked to have lived in, he used to use sexual violence as a form of “punishment” if/when I did wrong. I’ve lived in that world, and I never want to go back to it, nor would I ever wish that world on to anyone.

The other ridiculous argument I’ve heard in the last week is that the idea of and the statistics surrounding rape are a “feminist propaganda” spreading fear and hatred of men… I don’t even know where to start with this… As I’ve already said rape is not limited to men attacking women, but can be men attacking men, women attacking women, and women attacking men. Also, feminism isn’t about hating men, I’m not going to write a essay on what feminism is right now but basically anyone who thinks it’s about hating men really doesn’t know much about the topic.
Also, if we quickly think of the logistics of this we’ll see that it’s not really feasible; this idea relies on a MALE DOMIATED police force altering the statistics of reported rapes. Actually, to be honest I don’t think I need to continue that point as I think it speaks for itself.

What causes Abuse?

The causes of interpersonal abuse are complex and overlapping. However, the following are widely regarded to be some of the most important factors:

• Early learning experiences: This factor is sometimes described as the “life cycle” of abuse. Many abusive parents were themselves abused as children and have learned to see hurtful behavior as normal childrearing. At the other end of the life cycle, some adults who abuse their elderly parent are paying back the parent for abusing them in their early years.
• Ignorance of developmental timetables: Some parents have unrealistic expectations of children in terms of the appropriate age for toilet training, feeding themselves, and similar milestones, and attack their children for not meeting these expectations.
• Economic stress: Many caregivers cannot afford part-time day care for children or dependent elderly parents, which would relieve some of their emotional strain. Even middle-class families can be financially stressed if they find themselves responsible for the costs of caring for elderly parents before their own children are financially independent.
• Lack of social support or social resources: Caregivers who have the support of an extended family, religious group, or close friends and neighbors are less likely to lose their self-control under stress.
• Substance abuse: Alcohol and mood-altering drugs do not cause abuse directly, but they weaken or remove a person’s inhibitions against violence toward others. In addition, the cost of a drug habit often gives a substance addict another reason for resenting the needs of the dependent person. A majority of workplace bullies are substance addicts.
• Mental disorders: Depression, personality disorders, dissociative disorders, and anxiety disorders can all affect parents’ ability to care for their children appropriately. A small percentage of abusive parents or spouses are psychotic.
• Belief systems: Many men still think that they have a “right” to a relationship with a woman; and many people regard parents’ rights over children as absolute.
• The role of bystanders: Research in the social sciences has shown that one factor that encourages abusers to continue their hurtful behavior is discovering that people who know about or suspect the abuse are reluctant to get involved. In most cases, bystanders are afraid of possible physical, social, or legal consequences for reporting abuse. The result, however, is that many abusers come to see themselves as invulnerable.

Domestic violence against men study

The recent report from Scotland provides no new information for those familiar with the issue of domestic violence against men. Many of the more recent studies and research has found that male victims make up a significant amount of the victims of domestic violence, but the lack of support services, anti-male bias in the support community and cultural bias against male victims keeps men silent.

This does not often sit well with the domestic violence community, and several within the community are quick to dismiss any findings of high rates of violence against men. However, what the Scotland research showed is difficult to deny:

Interviewees were asked about their experience of physical or psychological partner abuse both since the age of 16 and within the preceding 12 months. The findings included:

• 18% of adults who had had at least one partner since the age of 16 reported having experienced at least one form of partner abuse. The figure for women was 20.9% and for men 15.3%.

• However, in the most recent 12 months the figure for both men and women was 5%.

• The data for the last 12 months showed that young men aged 16-24 experienced physical and/or psychological abuse more often than young women and more often than any other demographic group.

• For persons experiencing partner abuse in the last 12 months, 48% of the perpetrators were male and 45% were female.

• Police came to know about 35% of incidents of partner abuse reported by women in the preceding 12 months but only 8% of incidents in which a man was on the receiving end. 40% of men told no-one compared to 21% of women.

Again, there are those who would dismiss those findings. However, the problem with the research the domestic violence community prefers is that the language of some of those studies portrays the respondents as victims, and many men do not view themselves as victims. Part of this is because of the cultural narrative that women cannot hurt men, but part of it comes from the domestic violence community itself and its framing of domestic violence as a man-on-woman only crime. Nevertheless, the language issue can seriously impact the results of a study. As was noted in the article:

[John Forsyth said,]“The research has to be commended for its rigour. When asked whether they had been subject to domestic abuse since the age of 16, only 3% of men and 14% of women said yes. However, when asked to report specific conduct by a partner that falls within the definition of partner abuse, the number for men rose 5 times to 15% and for women by half to 20.9%. This is hardly surprising given the tens of millions that has been spent by successive Scottish administrations on campaigns, support services and organisations targeted at women, encouraging them to recognise and report domestic abuse. In the same period precisely nothing has been spent on efforts to encourage men to recognise and report domestic abuse.”

My emphasis. The shift in the reporting rate shows how damaging ignoring male victimization can be and specifically why domestic violence should not be presented as a crime against women. As more research is done and as more male victims come forward, it is beginning to appear that the actual rates of violence between men and women is not significantly different.

There is no harm in acknowledging that, but there is harm in not acknowledging male victims. Maintaining the double standard established by the domestic violence community leads to instances in which women who violently assault their male partners get slaps on the wrist even as the judge acknowledges the double standard at play. One constantly hears there is never an excuse for violence against women, yet the narrative coming from those same people is that violence against men is minimal, unimportant and excusable. Numbers like those above contradict those notions and organizations like The One in Three Campaign can help fight for the recognition of male victims.

Female sexual abusers

“Society expects the mother of a toddler would do everything in her power to make sure her child is protected from harm,”

While female sexual abusers are rare in the court system, those who deal with child sexual abuse know that cases that do come through are far from unique. A national study released in 2005 shows that biological mothers were the perpetrators of sexual abuse in five per cent of the substantiated cases investigated by child welfare authorities.

The instance is probably higher, since researchers are certain that many cases of child sexual abuse never come to light. “A lot of people have difficulty believing women are capable of sexually abusing children,”

Even victims of such abuse, looking back at it as adults, have a hard time talking about it. When work and survays have been done within prisons it is found that many men had been abused by women but that they often had difficulty identifying it as abuse.

A U.S. report, entitled Child Sexual Abuse — The Predators, explains it this way. “Mothers generally have more intimate contact with their children, and the lines between maternal love and care and sexual abuse are not as clear-cut as they are for fathers”. Therefore, the report says, “Sexual abuse by mothers may remain undetected because it occurs at home and is either denied or never reported.”

A 2003 U.S. study questioned a random sample of adults to determine the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse. It found that of the 32 per cent of females and 14 per cent of males who identified themselves as victims, nine per cent of women and 39 per cent of men said they had been abused by at least one female.

While figures are usually inflated, studies of male sex offenders show 45 to 50 per cent were themselves victims of sexual abuse. Currently research is ongoing into counselling practices for female survivors of sexual abuse to see if they should be asked if they’ve ever in turn abused anyone.

Why has it taken so long to bring out the problem of female sexual abuse?

Female sexual abuse seems to be more of a taboo because:

(1) Female sexual abuse is more threatening – it undermines feelings about how women should relate to children.
(2) It has taken years for people to recognise that children are sexually abused, but that sexual abuse has been placed in the context of male power and aggression. Women are not supposed to be sexually aggressive and the male power theory eliminates them as possible abusers, unless they are coerced by males.
(3) People find it difficult to understand exactly how a woman could sexually abuse a child. They are not seen to be capable of this kind of abuse.

(4) When adult survivors of female abuse have told their stories, they have often met with the rebuttal that they are fantasising. A child recently told that her mother had sexually abused her, along with the child’s father. The therapeutic team took the view that she was clearly projecting and fantasising. The abuse by the father was never in doubt. Only after a second assessment by a well-known team at a children’s hospital, was the child believed.
(5) Current statistics indicate that sexual abuse of children by females is rare. Estimates are that 5% of abuse of girls and 20% of abuse of boys is perpetrated by women’10. Previous statistics indicated that child sexual abuse was rare, even by males. That has since been shown to be untrue. Statistics are based upon what we are told and may give a false picture if some victims are not telling.

How many of the victims of female sexual abuse are boys? How many are girls?

Approximately 40% men; 60% women.
Do victims of female abuse suffer in similar ways to victims of male abuse?

Like the victims of male abuse, their lives have been dramatically affected. They have: turned to drugs, alcohol, solvents; often attempted suicide; and may have gender identity problems. One man, made to dress in girl’s underwear by his abusers, has continued this behaviour into adult life and has difficulty with relationships. A disturbing aspect of some of the cases is the hatred of and violence towards women and girls that some of the men admit feeling.

The abused also often have:
(i) difficulties maintaining relationships
(ii) unresolved anger, shame and guilt
(iii) self- mutilated
(iv) been anorexic or bulimic
(v) suffered chronic depression
(vi) suffered from panic attacks
(vii) become agoraphobic
(viii) in some cases, sexually abused children
(ix) been fearful of touching their own children

How much does abuse by mothers affect the adult survivors?
Those who were sexually abused by their mothers seem to have an overpowering need to find
bonding mother- love. Many of the survivors say that, though they hate their mothers for what they did, they still want to be loved by their mothers and would not confront them – as one woman said ‘with flowers, let alone with the abuse that she perpetrated on me’.